As the number and availability of broadcast channels for viewing on multiple channel television broadcast systems has continued to proliferate at an astonishing rate, the problem of navigating through the morass of available viewing selections has correspondingly become of more and more concern to the viewers of such systems. Today, programs, such as television broadcasting and Internet selections, are broadcast on televisions and computers on the airwaves, through cables, and via satellite. The sources of such programming today includes hundreds of stations.
Navigating through the great number of programs available for viewing is not an easy task. At the most basic level, a viewer may sequentially "channel surf" available channels by simply using the up or down channel key of a remote control device or the actual display screen, such as television or monitor, or the viewer may enter the desired channel directly into the remote or display if that is known. To assist in channel navigation, many broadcast systems and receivers provide electronic program guides (EPG) that allow the viewer to more easily and directly peruse the channels. Typically, EPGs employ a time-grid approach in which all of the available programming for a certain time period by channel is displayed.
A broadcast system may switch between an EPG and the program being broadcast or the EPG may just take up a portion of the available viewing area with the program continuing to be broadcast in the other portion of the screen. Given the limited resolution of television or monitor screens and the distance at which they are commonly viewed by viewers, navigating the EPG becomes difficult, even when the EPG is displayed "full-screen." Often only a relatively small window of programming, such as one and one-half hours, is displayed at one time in an effort to accommodate the limited resolution of the screen. When the viewer wishes to see programming beyond this window of programming, either prior to or after, a scrolling technique is often used.
As the viewer scrolls beyond the current screen to another time grid the screen display is completely updated and refreshed. The time required to refresh the screen can become tiresome to the viewer, particularly in cases where several time grids of the EPG are to be viewed. Additionally, this process can be somewhat confusing to the viewer who must try to remember the channel selections viewed on a previous view of the EPG. There currently exists a need in the art, therefore, to provide an improved EPG and method of channel surfing that will allow the viewer to quickly scan ahead or back in time.